High Frequency, High Power Density Integrated Point of Load and Bus Converters

The increased power consumption and power density d emands of modern technologies combined with the focus on global energy savings ha ve increased the demands on DC/DC power supplies. DC/DC converters are ubiquitous in every day life, found in products ranging from small handheld electronics requiring a few watts to warehouse sized server farms demanding over 50 megawatts. To improve efficiency and power d nsity while reducing complexity and cost the modular building block approach is gaining popularity. These modular building blocks replace individually designed specialty power suppl ies, providing instead an optimized complete solution. To meet the demands for lower loss and h igher power density, higher efficiency and higher frequency must be targeted in future designs . The objective of this dissertation is to explore and propose methods to improve the power de nsity and performance of point of load modules ranging from 10 to 600W. For non-isolated, low current point of load applica tions targeting outputs ranging from one to ten ampere, the use of a three level convert er is proposed to improve efficiency and power density. The three level converter can reduce the voltage stress across the devices by a factor of two compared to the traditional buck; reducing swit ching losses, and allowing for the use of improved low voltage lateral and lateral trench dev ic s. The three level can also significantly reduce the size of the inductor, facilitating 3D co nverter integration with a low profile magnetic by doubling the effective switching frequency and r e ucing the volt-second across the inductor.

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